Suppose you are in an unfamiliar city. You want to find a mall and do some shopping at your favorite department store. Upon entering, you see the sign with the layout of the mall. You find your desired destination on the map. Ahh…, nice feeling. But pause for just one moment, please. You now know exactly where you want to go. You even have a clear vision of yourself shopping in your favorite store. But at this moment, in a mall that is vastly unfamiliar to you, you still lack one piece of very vital information without which you may never find your favorite store. Think about this. You don’t know if you came in through the north, south, east or west entrance. So, until you know where you are, you cannot find the place you want to go. But there it is! Very clearly displayed on the map! Plain to see. Accompanied by a big red arrow. The words:

This present moment is where we always are. Someone has said, “The past is history, the future is a mystery, but the present moment is a gift – a present.” In our minds, many times we dwell in the past through regret and in the future through fear. But the only viable place we can ever be is in this present moment. This moment doesn’t need our goals. This moment doesn’t need our vision casting, This moment doesn’t need a mission statement. This moment is fine just like it is. Difficult events have passed. Choices have been made that can’t be changed. But this moment is the perfect spot from which to reach your future destination because it is the only spot in time or space from which you can do so.

That makes sense, but shouldn’t we have goals and ambitions? Without them would we ever accomplish anything?

I’m afraid of the present moment. I don’t like it. I want something more.

Well, at least you are afraid of something that is real, because there is only one true statement we can make about both the past and the future: “They don’t exist.” The present moment is all there ever is and as long as we are in the future or the past, we remain lost in the present moment. How do you reach a destination without a place to begin? If you are afraid that standing in this moment, accepting it exactly as it is without judgment, will bring your life to a stop, consider this. There is no place within the universe that is completely static (without movement). No matter how still you are, you are still moving. The earth rotates on its axis at roughly 1000 miles per hour, the earth circles the sun at nearly 70,000 mph, and our solar system rotates around the galaxy at 514,000 mph while the galaxy itself moves within the universe at 515,000 mph. How incredible that we are moving so fast and in so many directions all at the same time. If you were aware of it all, your head would be spinning. I got dizzy just writing about it. It is interesting that being still and fully present with the moment could bring such clarity, insight, creativity. Someone has said that creativity is born in silence. As Eckhart Tolle has said, “It is our level of awareness within this present moment that determines our future.” (From “The Power of Now”) No matter how far we feel we are from home, the journey back is merely a re-awakening to what we always were and forever will be. True. Circumstances have changed, new situations have occurred – strength and resources have diminished perhaps, but YOU are the same as YOU have always been. Where once from home we dreamed we were in grander destinations, now we dream we are exiled in foreign lands. We need only awaken from the dreaming to find we are safely home again. (Adapted from A Course In Miracles) So relax. Take a deep breath and find your new starting point in this beautiful moment. You are here.